My Mondays

It's been too long since I've written anything here. My mind has been all over the place lately.

So it's Monday. I'm noticing a pattern here. On Monday I tend to feel the need for some self nurturing or relaxation. I want to spend the day enjoying whatever the weather is, reading a book, contemplating quotes, drinking coffee, listening to music and all while wearing something that makes me feel good. Lately I've beaten myself up for feeling this way on a Monday morning, because aren't Mondays supposed to be the day you get back to work? The day you get back into the routine you fell out of over the weekend? Even just last year I was totally loving Mondays because they did mean it was time to get back into a routine and feel productive. I guess I'm not the same person I was a year ago. Well I know I'm not the same person I was a year ago. So why should I try to be that person or any version of myself I was in the past? I guess this is why being in the moment and being self aware is important. What worked for me a few months ago may not work for me now and that's ok.

I realize that my perfect Monday may just sound like I'm trying to give myself a 3 day weekend...that's part of the reason why I've been beating myself up about it. Why do I deserve a 3 day weekend? The truth is, it's not really a 3 day weekend. At least not for me.  A lot of the time now my Saturdays are work days...if I don't have a photo shoot scheduled I'm meeting up with my friend/new business partner to go over things for at least half the day. Sunday mornings I may be laying in bed watching Super Soul Sunday but that's also the day where I do laundry and clean up a little bit. And sometimes I throw in a little bit of socializing and for me socializing is stressful, so it's not always relaxing the way it should be.  So my weekends aren't what I think a typical weekend is for most people. My weekend isn't a complete break from working. I've realized that maybe on Monday I just need time to recover from excess time around family or from working or from socializing and doing chores. It doesn't matter what anyone else thinks. It doesn't matter how anyone else does it. What matters is what works for me and if I'm being productive during my actual "work time".

So this morning I spent just a short time feeling crappy about how I was laying in bed going through a book about the paleo "diet"/way of living. I only felt bad about not getting up before 8am for a little while. Then for some reason I realized that this is ok. It's ok for my Mondays to be like this. If I want to wake up and drink coffee in bed while reading whatever I choose to read it's ok. If I want to sit on my computer watching reruns of Super Soul Sunday or blogging or posting things to the happiness group and contemplating my own happiness project...it's all ok. Just accept it and move on and when my Monday routine feels the need to change again, it will. Something is always changing and I feel discomfort when the change comes and instead of getting all bent out of shape about it and feeling like a terrible human being I just have to accept it, roll with it and readjust. It's that simple (but so very hard sometimes).

I drove 4 hours on Thursday to spend some extra time with my brother and his family since my nephew's birthday party would be happening on Saturday. On Friday my parents got there. That's 5 adults and 3 kids running around and zero places for me to go when I need space. Plus I'm there to spend time with them not to be alone so even in those moments I so desperately want to be alone I don't allow it. Unless I'm taking a shower or using the bathroom. Saturday was the party. My sister and her daughter were there as well as my other brother and his 3 kids. My sister in law has a large family and when you add them to my family I think there's at least a total of 25...I'm sure there's more than that and I'm just losing track. Plus some of my nephew's friends from school were there along with their parents.  It's a lot of people for someone like me to be around. It's nothing new though...I've been to enough of these birthday parties to know how many people will be there and I've met them all before and had conversations with them all. But sometimes I get super anxious about it. This time around a good bit of my sister in law's family arrived before the rest of my family did and my social anxiety had kicked in big time. I wanted to disappear and zone out. I preferred to sit outside and watch the kids play. I was playing around on my phone. I eventually calmed down and the anxiety wore off but I couldn't wait for the end of the day when everyone left and I could put my pajamas on...even if it was only 5pm. Social situations stress me out sometimes. Then on Sunday it was time to make the 4 hour drive back home, which can sometimes be mind numbing and ridiculously uncomfortable. By the time I got home I was just so completely worn out. (And so completely happy that I cleaned my room, made the bed and put all of my laundry away before I even left on Thursday)

So with all of that going on for  4 days, why shouldn't I do whatever I need to do today to get myself back on track. To find some sort of balance. The sooner I accept that my work week isn't like everyone else's and doesn't have to be, the sooner I'll be happier and probably more productive. I'll spend less time worrying what other people think about how I'm spending my Monday and more time being me.

Happy Monday!

♥